Tag: daughters of narcissistic mothers

Dealing with a toxic parent is frustrating and it can interfere with your personal life.

Setting boundaries with them can feel impossible. You don’t know whether to go low contact or no contact with them. The feelings driving you are coming from your subconscious belief system that has been conditioned into you by the parent, and society.

You may feel like you are taking the more noble path by continuing to cater to them, but you are being driven by habits that have been repeated since your childhood. Thought behaviors and conditioned emotions drive your choices.

You can override your conditioned patterns, but you have to identify what false beliefs you are holding first.

If you are the scapegoat in your family, then you are the one that gets the most blame for things. They consider you the “difficult” family member…usually you are the one who will not get with the program.

Narcissists like to create their own narrative of the family, including assigning roles to each family member, and creating a cover story of how the family interactions are normal. Someone has to be blamed in this kind of family.

It is a given that the narcissist gets special treatment in the family, and the family members are trained to go along with this. Everyone knows there are consequences and punishments for not complying with what the narcissist wants.

The narcissist never takes any blame for things, and they might have made portrayed you as mentally disturbed, or defiant to outsiders of the family. The narcissist, of course, was the good parent who did their best to help you, in spite of your problems.

Usually this person is targeted by the abuser because of their resistance to pretending that the household is normal.

If you were the truth teller…the revealer… in the family then you pointed out when boundaries were being crossed and when the other people were being mistreated. You were the one that probably defended siblings who were being abused. You may have tried to draw the abuse towards yourself in order to protect younger siblings from getting the brunt of it.

Very often the main abusive parent has Narcissistic Personality Disorder, although there are other personality disorders which cause people to abuse their children, like Malignant Borderline Personality Disorder.

The narcissistic parent us the focal point of the family because they demand that their needs and desires are primary. The needs of the scapegoat are ignored. They are labeled as the troublemaker in the family. Things they say are often used against them.

Fault for most every problem in the family ends of being dumped onto the scapegoat. The narcissist projects their own faults and personality disorder into the scapegoat.

The scapegoat is the one that can see that something is wrong with the narcissistic parent ans their behavior. The narcissist wants everyone in the family to pretend that everything is normal and their abusive behaviors are not abusive. The scapegoat angers the narcissist by being able to see through the false reality they create.

If you were the scapegoat child then your accomplishments were ignored or minimized. You were compared to other family members and the narcissistic parent would see to it that your accomplishments were seen as less than the other children’s and their own.

Family decisions may have been made without you in family meeting that you were intentionally not invited to. Yet you were still expected to go along with the decisions that narcissist made without expressing any dislike or negative feelings about anything.

You were emotionally punished for any resistance to what the narcissist wanted to do, even if it was harmful to you or others in the family.

As an adult the narcissist probably gossips about you and talks about you behind your back. They twist around the reality of things you say and do, in order to give a false image to others about you. You are called selfish behind your back anytime you tell the narcissist “no” or try to set healthy boundaries for the preservation of your mental health.

Your mental health is not only considered unimportant, but it is attacked intentionally by the narcissistic parent in order to undermine you.

They use techniques like gaslighting and triangulating to break you down. You end up looking like the one who is at fault in the relationship because the narcissist lies to the other family members about you.

Even though the abusive parent is the unstable one, you are often made out to be the one that is mentally disordered.

Your behaviors are taken out of context and re-framed by the narcissist to appear illogical, irrational or selfish. By the time to are able to tell your side of the story to anyone, it is too late because the narcissist got to them first and has been spreading a smear campaign against you.

At times you may be shunned by the narcissist or by the entire family, because the narcissist tells them that they should not speak to you.

However when someone is needed to step in during an emergency you are often the first one they will call and expect to drop everything to help. You are expected to be the problem solver and the one to offer assistance, even after you were made to feel inadequate in the past.

Responsibility is not equally allotted or equally shared.

The scapegoat is always expected to do more than anyone else without complaining, and they are expected to do the work that no one else wants to do.

There is never any thank you or credit given to the scapegoat for doing things for the family. In fact there will be a big deal made over a little thing that the golden child did for the narcissist, while your contribution and efforts are minimized or forgotten…until the next time they need something from you.

Scapegoating is a reflection on the person refusing to take responsibility or be held accountable, not the person being blamed. The scapegoat also provides a buffer against reality to support the family denial. The scapegoat carries the lion’s share of the blame, shame, anger and rejection so narcissistic mother can maintain her patterns of dysfunction while continuing to appear normal.

The scapegoat is punished by several methods. Shaming, ignoring, minimizing accomplishments, undermining, abused, rejected, singled out for blame.

scapegoatsofanarcissisticmother.blogspot.com

The narcissistic parent will tell people that they have done many things for you and that they gave tried to be supportive of you. They will tell others that they have been a good parent for you and that you do not appreciate their efforts. They will sometimes go so far as to claim that you are abusive to them and play the victim themselves.

The golden child is the sibling that is put on a pedestal by the parent and expected to make the narcissist look good.

The parent claims the credit for the accomplishments of the golden child. The golden child will remain in the favor of the narcissist as long as they succeed and accomplish the things that the narcissist approves of.

The rules for the golden child and the scapegoat are never the same.

The scapegoat will be punished for things that the golden child is not punished for. The golden child will be praised for things that are ignored or undermined when the scapegoat accomplishes them or tries to accomplish them.

The narcissistic parent will undermine the scapegoat and at the same time say to them “I am doing this for your own good” They disguise their cruel, undermining, manipulative tactics as loving guidance.

There are many tactics that the narcissistic parent will use to undermine the scapegoat. The family often becomes blind to the tactics of the narcissist against the scapegoat. They do not see that the scapegoat is being attacked and undermined.

Some adults choose to break off contact with the narcissistic parent for their own mental preservation. Others are shunned by the narcissist and sometimes the entire family.

If you choose to continue interaction with a narcissistic parent, you have to learn how to maintain boundaries and not allow anyone in the family to violate them. Most likely this will anger the family members who are not used to you maintaining the same boundaries that they expect you to respect for them.

They feel entitled to be treated with respect and to be able to set boundaries about their time, their emotions, their relationships, etc. But they do not often respect your right to set the same exact boundaries for yourself.

You are not seen by the narcissist as a real person that has the right to your own thoughts, feelings, ideas or a right to personal boundaries.

You should prioritize your mental health and your life and make any decisions about interacting with your family members based on what is best for you.

If they have never been happy with anything you have done by now, then what are the chances that continuing to try to please them will gain their appreciation and approval?

Usually this person is targeted by the abuser because of their resistance to pretending that the household is normal.

If you were the truth teller in the family then you pointed out when boundaries were being crossed and when the other people were being mistreated.You were the one that probably defended siblings who were being abused. You may have tried to draw the abuse towards yourself in order to protect younger siblings from getting the brunt of it.

Very often the main abusive parent has Narcissistic Personality Disorder, although there are other personality disorders which cause people to abuse their children, like malignant borderline personality disorder.

The narcissistic parent us the focal point of the family because they demand that their needs and desires are primary. The needs of the scapegoat are ignored. They are labeled as the troublemaker in the family. Things they say are often used against them.

Fault for most every problem in the family ends of being dumped onto the scapegoat. The narcissist projects their own faults and personality disorder into the scapegoat.

The scapegoat is the one that can see that something is wrong with the narcissistic parent ans their behavior. The narcissist wants everyone in the family to pretend that everything is normal and their abusive behaviors are not abusive. The scapegoat angers the narcissist by being able to see through the false reality they create.

If you were the scapegoat child then your accomplishments were ignored or minimized. You were compared to other family members and the narcissistic parent would see to it that your accomplishments were seen as less than the other children’s and their own.

Family decisions may have been made without you in family meeting that you were intentionally not invited to. Yet you were still expected to go along with the decisions that narcissist made without expressing any dislike or negative feelings about anything.

You were emotionally punished for any resistance to what the narcissist wanted to do, even if it was harmful to you or others in the family.

As an adult the narcissist probably gossips about you and talks about you behind your back. They twist around the reality of things you say and do, in order to give a false image to others about you. You are called selfish behind your back anytime you tell the narcissist “no” or try to set healthy boundaries for the preservation of your mental health.

Your mental health is not only considered unimportant, but it is attacked intentionally by the narcissistic parent in order to undermine you.

They use techniques like gaslighting and triangulating to break you down. You end up looking like the one who is at fault in the relationship because the narcissist lies to the other family members about you.

Even though the abusive parent is the unstable one, you are often made out to be the one that is mentally disordered.

Your behaviors are taken out of context and re-framed by the narcissist to appear illogical, irrational or selfish. By the time to are able to tell your side of the story to anyone, it is too late because the narcissist got to them first and has been spreading a smear campaign against you.

At times you may be shunned by the narcissist or by the entire family, because the narcissist tells them that they should not speak to you.

However when someone is needed to step in during an emergency you are often the first one they will call and expect to drop everything to help. You are expected to be the problem solver and the one to offer assistance, even after you were made to feel inadequate in the past.

Responsibility is not equally allotted or equally shared.

The scapegoat is always expected to do more than anyone else without complaining, and they are expected to do the work that no one else wants to do.

There is never any thank you or credit given to the scapegoat for doing things for the family. In fact there will be a big deal made over a little thing that the golden child did for the narcissist, while your contribution and efforts are minimized or forgotten…until the next time they need something from you.

Scapegoating is a reflection on the person refusing to take responsibility or be held accountable, not the person being blamed. The scapegoat also provides a buffer against reality to support the family denial. The scapegoat carries the lion’s share of the blame, shame, anger and rejection so narcissistic mother can maintain her patterns of dysfunction while continuing to appear normal.

The scapegoat is punished by several methods. Shaming, ignoring, minimizing accomplishments, undermining, abused, rejected, singled out for blame.

scapegoatsofanarcissisticmother.blogspot.com

The narcissistic parent will tell people that they have done many things for you and that they gave tried to be supportive of you. They will tell others that they have been a good parent for you and that you do not appreciate their efforts. They will sometimes go so far as to claim that you are abusive to them and play the victim themselves.

The golden child is the sibling that is put on a pedestal by the parent and expected to make the narcissist look good.

The parent claims the credit for the accomplishments of the golden child. The golden child will remain in the favor of the narcissist as long as they succeed and accomplish the things that the narcissist approves of.

The rules for the golden child and the scapegoat are never the same.

The scapegoat will be punished for things that the golden child is not punished for. The golden child will be praised for things that are ignored or undermined when the scapegoat accomplishes them or tries to accomplish them.

The narcissistic parent will undermine the scapegoat and at the same time say to them “I am doing this for your own good” They disguise their cruel, undermining, manipulative tactics as loving guidance.

There are many tactics that the narcissistic parent will use to undermine the scapegoat. The family often becomes blind to the tactics of the narcissist against the scapegoat. They do not see that the scapegoat is being attacked and undermined.

Some adults choose to break off contact with the narcissistic parent for their own mental preservation. Others are shunned by the narcissist and sometimes the entire family.

If you choose to continue interaction with a narcissistic parent, you have to learn how to maintain boundaries and not allow anyone in the family to violate them. Most likely this will anger the family members who are not used to you maintaining the same boundaries that they expect you to respect for them.

They feel entitled to be treated with respect and to be able to set boundaries about their time, their emotions, their relationships, etc. But they do not often respect your right to set the same exact boundaries for yourself.

You are not seen by the narcissist as a real person that has the right to your own thoughts, feelings, ideas or a right to personal boundaries.

You should prioritize your mental health and your life and make any decisions about interacting with your family members based on what is best for you.

If they have never been happy with anything you have done by now, then what are the chances that continuing to try to please them will gain their appreciation and approval?

You have the right to live your life and follow your dreams. Our blood relatives are the people that we were given as family, but you can choose other people to consider your family. You should be surrounded by people who support you.

Saying “no” to people comes very easily to some and is nearly impossible for others.

I have found that many people with C-PTSD have trouble saying no. If you were brought up in a mentally or otherwise abusive childhood, saying “NO,” may be associated with severe consequences to you.

If you lived with a parent that had narcissistic personality disorder or borderline personality disorder, then they probably used confusion tactics on you, to the point where there was “no” way to say no to them.

It may be difficult to tell what situations that “NO,” would be perfectly okay, and what situations where saying no, would really cause a problem.

If you grew up in an environment where your feelings and thoughts were not considered relevant, then you probably feel that your feeling of wanting to say no, just does not count. Even though the same person may say “No” to you all the time, you do not feel that you have the same right to say no, that they do.

If you were even in an abusive situation where disobeying meant punishment , then you probably have a fear of retaliation from others. There is an anxiety response triggered by saying no and refusing to comply with another person’s request.

THE ACT OF SAYING NO, CAN TRIGGER A VERY UNCOMFORTABLE PHYSIOLOGICAL RESPONSE. IN ORDER TO AVOID FEELING SEVERELY UNCOMFORTABLE, WE JUST SAY “YES” WHEN WE REALLY WANT TO SAY “NO.”

Triggers are very real and the tendency is to want to avoid feeling the bodily sensations associated with them. Ignoring triggers and going against our conditioned responses, is a very difficult thing to do.

IT IS PERFECTLY NORMAL AND ACCEPTABLE FOR YOU TO SAY “NO” TO PEOPLE WHEN THEY ARE ASKING YOU TO DO SOMETHING THAT YOU DO NOT WANT TO DO OR SOMETHING WHICH CROSSES YOUR BOUNDARIES.

You are allowed to set personal boundaries for yourself. You can also set boundaries for certain people that you do not want crossed.

You can set boundaries in regards to your emotions, your time, your energy, your work and your social interactions. You can set boundaries in regards to dating, doing work for people and doing favors for people.

You can set boundaries about your personal space and your personal items.

Any situation where someone is trying to get you to do something by using your emotions against you, is a situation where your boundaries need to come into play.

Sometimes people do not accept your simple NO or your reasons for saying NO. They try to convince you be making you feel guilty or by shaming you.

They are trying to use your good and caring personality against you.

They want you to feel bad and they do this by intentionally pushing whatever buttons they know you have. If they know that you want to feel like you are cooperative they will call you uncooperative.

If they know that you have helped them many times in the past, they will lie and tell you that they do not remember the last time you did them any favors.

Don’t fall for these manipulative behaviors. If someone feels the need to make you feel guilty in order to do them a favor, then they really do not deserve the favor.

People should accept No, especially if you have perfectly good reasons for saying no, even if the reason is that you just do not feel comfortable doing it or do not want to do it.

Here is a list of ways to say NO…

No.

No, thank you.

No, I really cannot do that.

No, I do not want to do that.

No, I am not interested in that.

No, I cannot find time in my schedule to do that.

No, I am just too overloaded right now, to do that.

No, I am not interested in doing that.

No, you go ahead without me.

No, please ask someone else.

No, I do not have to think about it. I would rather tell you NO right now.

I said no. Please respect my answer

If you have a history with this person that tells you that they will counter any reasons you give them for saying No, then you can try something like this..

“In the past my giving reasons for my No, seems to have just been an opening for someone to tell me the reasons are not good enough or to dispute my reasons in some way. So this time I am going to say simply No without going over my reasons with you. “

If they refuse to accept your “no”, then you still do not have to do what they want just to make them stop complaining.

Just because they are going to upset that you told them “no”, does not mean that you are responsible for their feelings. As long as you were not intentionally trying to hurt their feelings, then you did not cause for them to feel bad.

If someone is an adult then they are responsible for their own feelings. Much of the time, manipulative people are acting when they get dramatic with you. They can be very dramatic about how disappointed they are in you or about how selfish they think you are.

These are more reasons not to tell them “yes” every time they demand something from you. The more times they are able to manipulate you, the more they will resort to the same tactics over and over again.

**Please note that this article is not talking about partner relationships where the person will physically abuse you or will otherwise punish you for saying no. Those relationships are volatile and should be escaped as soon as possible but I never recommend to ignite retaliation in a severely abusive person.

It is designed more for situations where you are in no immediate danger or impending danger.

This article is also not a recommendation to tell your boss no to doing work, thus risking your job. If your boss is abusive it is a different topic and must be handled with a different strategy that is not discussed in this post.

Parents with narcissistic personality disorder never think of their adult children as adults. There is no respect for boundaries or your right to make your own decisions.

While other parents guide their children to become independent adults, narcissistic parents attempt to condition their children to serve their agenda.

Whether you are the golden child or the scapegoat is dependent on a variety of factors. Usually one child is chosen to be the golden child. If they comply with the wishes of the narcissistic parent, then they will probably retain that role. Otherwise they are in danger of being knocked off of the pedestal.

The scapegoat child is often the one that insisted on being authentic and questioned or exposed the methods of the narcissistic parent. Other times the scapegoated child just got that role because there was already a golden child in place.

The narcissistic parent projects the qualities of their grandios false self onto the chosen one…the golden child. There is unreasonable pressure put onto this child to live up to what the parent demands.

Scapegoated children can be subjected to mobbing by the family members. The narcissist creates the narrative for the family. Anyone who does not follow blindly is usually punished.

As part of this shared psychosis, created by the narcissist, the blame for any faults, failures or shortcomings of the narcissist will be put onto the scapegoat.

Different families have somewhat different dynamics, since there can be more than two children. Some children may be ignored completely because they do not fill the role of either the golden child or the scapegoat.

Anyone can be knocked off the pedestal at any time. Narcissists can be vindictive and quick to punish with emotional or other means.

Adult children of narcissistic parents carry trauma from their childhood. How they interact with the narcissistic parent may keep them in a childish lifestyle, or they may divorce the narcissistic parent and break contact with them.

Other adult children struggle to maintain independence while the narcissist makes their lives a living hell.

Learning about narcissism and pathological liars, can help you to understand why your relationship with your parents is like other people’s. Malignant narcissists are master deceivers and manipulators.

If you grew up with a narcissistic parent then you may be suffering from C-PTSD from emotional, mental or other abuses. Finding out more about emotional trauma and C-PTSD can help you to find freedom from the narcissistic chains that bind you.

Even if you have gone No Contact, or have limited contact, the emotional trauma and emotional flashbacks can still permeate your life.

🌷Check out the gentlekindness facebook page and gentlekindnesscoaching.com site for more information and help with Overcoming Narcissistic Abuse

While our brain is designed to protect us, sometimes the different parts of your brain fail to coordinate properly. The triunal brain theory teaches us that we are driven by the parts of the brain we are not conscious of.

It isn’t that we cannot discover what beliefs the subconscious brain is holding. It is more that we do not recognize the importance of doing so. There are methods of trance, hypnosis and NLP that can guide you to connect with what is driving your choices and behaviors.

Staying in a toxic relationship is something that many people do. Outsiders to the relationship may either judge you for stsying in it, or they may judge you for considering leaving it. In fact there may be both kinds of social pressure coming at you from different directions.

The subconscious brain holds core beliefs that have been imbedded and programmed since childhood. One belief that may have been programmed into you is that “good family members” tolerate any and every behavior from other family members.

You may be holding the belief that while breaking off relationships with people outside the family is okay, you should never break off relationships with family members.

Toxic family members are often catered to by the family. When other family members become exhausted and drainef of all their energy, they expect you to take over the “catering” role.

Saying No to the toxic family member will be punished and retaliated against. They will shame and guilt you, using yout “brain programming” against you.

It is often the person that put the programs there in the first place, that is emotionally manipulating you. They know which buttons to press because they put them there in the first place. Or they witnesssed how you were trained to feel.

In toxic families, you are not only trainef to behave in a certain way, but you are conditioned to FEEL certain ways in certain situations. A toxic family member will train you to respond to their emotional manipulation, in order to avoid real or perceived consequences.

Getting in touch with our feelings and beliefs that are behind the scenes, can help you to take your power back. Someone can only emotionally manipulate you if they are able to elicit those negative feelings in you.

When you are in a situation where the toxic person is making you feel bad…STOP and evaluate what you are feeling. Decide to detach emotionally from the situation and assess it like an observer.

Observe and notice what thoughts are coming up at the back of your brain. What thoughts, fears and drives are at work in your brain?

Sometimes the very things we do in order to avoid pain, will end up keeping us in a relationship that gives us continuous pain.

The subconscious brain will kick on the fight or flight mode, when we are in a confrontation or conversation with the toxic family member. This function of fight or flight, wants to cause you to take an immediate action to get rid of the threat and avoid harm. But your reptilian brain and your limbic system are only operating out of what associations that have been programmed in, and the beliefs that they hold.

If you were raised in a family with a toxic person ( or people) then there are “false beliefs” that are carried by your subconscious. The feelings you have that drive you to comply with the toxic person, are based on a false belief system.

It is in the best interest of the malignant, pathological person for you to hold onto beliefs like the following.

1. The toxic person does not harm me intentionally

2. They cannot help their behavior

3. They think their behavior is the best for the family

4. I am not worthy of standing up for myself

5. Standing up to the emotionally abusive person is rude

6. I have to do what the manipulative person wants, if I cannot reasonably get them to see my side

7. The toxic person hears me when I explain my side

8. Going against what the family wants would make me a bad person

9 Deep down the toxic person actually appreciates all I do for them

10. The manipulative family member would break down and not be able to go on, if I stopped catering to them

11. The family would fall apart without my holding it together

12. My independence and happiness is not a priority over the family

13. If I really needed something they would be there for me

14. My needs, desires and dreams are not as important as the other family members, or as the toxic person

15. My perceptions are not valid when they are different than those of the family, or the manipulative person

16. Prioritizing my mental, emotional and physical health over the demands of the family is wrong.

17. I could not survive without the family

18. I owe my family, and the toxic person, to stay and cater to them for my entire life

19. If I leave they will no longer love me. ( This is based on the false assumption that they love you now)

20. The toxic person loves me. They just don’t know how to show it

21. Taking abuse from someone proves your love for them.

These are all incorrect, untrue, false beliefs that are carried my adult children of toxic families. Sometimes your family is just who you were born to.

You have no obligation to people just because you share a blood line with them. All the time and energy they demand from you could be spent with people who actually deserve it.

There are people waiting to meet you, who would support and care for you. There is a higher path and sporitual connectedness for your life.

You have to emotionally detach from the narcissists,psychopaths, and emotionally manipulative, abusive people in your life.

Chances are the family will not fall to ruins without you, although they may try to manipulate you into thinking that. They can either respect you as an individual with rights and boundaries, or they can live without you.

Depression can make you feel like staying in bed and not interacting with other people. You know that if you go out of the house, you will feel different and out of place.

Other people will not understand your inner world. You feel like you will be forced to put on a mask to fit in. It is difficult to function.

You get more and more internalized. So you self isolate, and limit your social interactions. This is understandable because certain kinds of interactions can be emotionally traumatizing.

You feel like the one person that is out of place in the world. You sit alone and hear the thoughts that come up from your subconscious. Thoughts that there is something wrong with you.

Some of the feelings you get are from emotional flashbacks. There are things that happened and ways you were rejected during childhood that cause your subconscious to store these kinds of feelings.

If you can identify the false beliefs behind your thoughts, then the feelings can be sat with and calmed. You were not born feeling like you did not belong in the world. These thoughts were taught to you….even brainwashed into you.

When you have a feeling that is painful, like hopelessness…try to discover what core belief that thought is driven by. The belief might be that you are not as good as other people. .. Or that the world is unsafe.

If you are carrying the core belief that you are less adequate than other people…that is a bad programming. These things are programmed into children who do not have emotionally supportive childhoods.

Think back to your childhood and if you were made to feel insignificant, unworthy, unneccesary, or anything else negative. If your thoughts and feelings were dismissed, criticized, or made fun of then you are probably carrying CPTSD…complex post traumatic stress disorder.

People with C-PTSD often get depressed or feel extreme anxiety. You may have trouble keeping up with other people or feeling normal.

Those false core beliefs that were fed to you can be re-programmed. You need to question each one of those negative beliefs about yourself. Be like a scientist attempting to disprove a theory.

If you feel that something is wrong with you compared to other people, then ask what things are Right about you. Write them down. Engage in activities that prove you are as good or better at those activities, than other people are.

Look at the qualities of your parents and whomever fed those negative, false beliefs to you, about yourself. What kind of people are they?

Would you consider those people reliable critics? Did tbey have any agenda in which lowering your power would have helped them?

If those people told you something bad about the character of a person you love right now….would you believe their opinion without question? Or is their opinion not reliable?

You can begin to go out and interact with people in small increments. Go over your present state of mind, before you go out…and before you leave your car. You can just sit in your car for a few minutes and listen to music that calms or peps up your nervous system.

How you feel when you interact with others is based on the current state of your nervous system, how much sleep you have had, your mental state, and your blood sugar.

You can think of those categories and assess each of them, before you go into a store or any other place. Then you will feel more in touch with yourself and have some ways to help yourself.

If you are interested in learning. NLP State Management techniques, you can send me a message via my web site

Gentlekindnesscoaching.com

For information about C-PTSD and how emotional abuse causes depression and anxiety disorders, join us at the gentlekindness facebook page.

You are special. Your gifts and personality are an important part of the puzzle of humanity. You are connected with all living things in an important way.

You matter. You have a unique voice that other people need to hear. You have special characteristics that someone really needs right now.

Depression can feel like some outer dark force is trying to destroy you. People with severe depression have differences in MRI scans than other people. But even though it shows up as a physiological illness, it often feels like something else.

It can feel as though your mind is being darkened by an outside, malevolent force. Many people with severe depression have experienced mental abuse, even if it was acvompanied by other manifestations of abuse.

Mental abuse is an intentional manipulation of another person’s mind and perceptions of reality. It is an interferance with a person’s perception of themselves, their identity, and even their mental state.

People can be abused for years and never know it was abuse, because they were too young to understand, or the abuser caused a “shared psychosis” that made them perceive the abuse as something else.

Depression can feel like a malevolent force trying to manipulate and destroy you. This can be a result of past abuse that is still affecting the brain. When someone’s core reality, and identity is interfered with it does not just go away, once the abuser is no longer around to continue the abuse.

Adults who are mentally abusee by a partner can have PTSD for months or even years after the abuser has left. The abuser does this intentionally. They want control over the victim to last long after they are gone.

They engineer this in order to maintain a hold over the victim after they are gone. There are a few reasons for this, including reserving the victim on the back burner in case the abuser decides to hoover you back into their luves again, later on.

It also gives the narcissist a feeling of grandios power to have such a hold over another human being. It makes them feel godlike.

Not all people with depression were abused, but many of them were and are not attributing it to the abuse.

But this sensation that the depression is sufgocating a darkness around you from the outside, could possibly be a clue that there was some severe manipulation to your mind, by a narcissist or a psychopathic narcissist that you do not remember.

Living with a pathological narcissist means being forced into giving up your own identity, dreams, rights, and opinions. They are always right, , and anything you do that seems like you are trying to be an equal, will be shut down.

It is difficult for people who have not lived under the heavy weight, of the dark shadow, of a pathological narcissist to understand.

People will tell you that all you have to do is stand up to them, and assert your boundaries. But if you have lived with one of ….”the people that have no conscience” … then you know that the consequences that follow any attempt to assert your individuality, are met with severe punishment.

The malignant narcissist knows the weaknesses of their victim. If you love your children, they will threaten them, or turn them against you.

If you need your car to get to work, they will remove your car and refuse to return it until you submit. If you have friends, they will manipulate them, lie to them and ruin your relationships.

If you are seriously ill, they will tell people you are faking being sick to get out of seeing them. They will “accidentally” run into your employer and tell them you are pretending to be sick in order to get time off from work.

If you are struggling financially, due to repeated undermining behaviors by the narcissist, they will tell others how much they have helped you financially, and how ungrateful you are behaving to them.

If they humiliate you be spreading personal information they spied through your computer to discover, they will make it clear to you that they have more dirt on you. ….. Comply or suffer.

They will convince you to quit your job and then shame you. They will offer for you to move in with them, saying they need you there, only to send out Christmas card letters telling everyone how much you are imposing on them.

When you attempt to get a job, or start a business, to make enough money to move out, they will undermine you at every turn. …steal your keys and take your car out for an oil change, when you need to get to work.

When you complain that they took your car when you needed to get to work, they will tell you that since they are now helping with the maintenance of the vehicle ( the one oil change that it did not need, and you did not ask for) that the title to the car should actually be in their name… It’s only fair, right?

When you have a business appointment that you have to get to on time, they will block your car in with theirs, so you cannot get out.

When you ask them to move their car, they will demand all the information about your business, so that they can further undermine you.

When you get a pet for comfort, they steal the supplies you bought for it, and put them where you cannot reach them. Then they nail the cage to a table in their yard, so that you cannot take it.

If you purchase any property, like furniture, they will insist it was always theirs. If it becomes damaged they will demand that you pay for it.

If you live with a psychopathic narcissist, they will break your appliances and scream at you for breaking them. You will go without a shower or a stove….even when you rent (which is unreasonanly high) has always been paid on time to them.

When you tell them that these things are legally required to be working, they will tell you they have other projects to finish in the house first, such as new wall paper in their bedroom.

If you use their shower and the pipe behind the wall leaks, they will tell you the water damage was caused by you not knowing how to use the shower curtain. When you show them the floor next to the shower is dry, they ignore you and continue to explain how to properly pull the shower curtain closed, so that you do not damage their house again.

When you ask the plumber, right in front of the narcissist, if water from the shower curtain not being pulled tight could send water pouring through two floors of celings, he laughs and says no. When you remind the narcissist of this conversation the next time they tell you there was water damage due to your not pulling the shower curtain closed, they deny the plumber was ever there.

When the therapist tells you to bring the narcissist to therapy with you, because the therapist feels that everyone can live in harmony once the therapist teaches everone proper techniques for communication, DON’T DO IT!

The narcissist is not unaware of methods for communication. Their methods are intentional and not accidental.

Make no mistake. The narcissist is in full control of their communication methods.

They are able to behave during the idealization (honermoon) phase. They are not confused as to why everyone is not getting along… or about why all the relationships around them are in chaos.

They divide and conquer, with a Machiavellian philosophy.

The ends jusitifies the means.

They say one thing to you, and the opposite to someone else. They deny saying things, manipulating you, and threatening you.

They will never admit what they do, or what they say to you behind closed doors. They deny reality to discredit you, turn people against you, and to create chaos so that they can be on top.

They intentionally use techniques of brainwashing and creating a … “shared psychosis”…in order to to scapegoat certain people. The family members who seem to want to hold onto their identity, and will not let the narcissist make them bow down to their greatness.

The narcissist will retaliate against you when you try to shed light on the truth. Their secret identity is hidden under the mask, and they hate you for knowing who they really are.

They will stop at nothing to destroy you, financially, socially, and physically. Their tactics will cause deterioration of your physical and mental health.

Why don’t people simply just stand up to the narcissist they are living with and assert themselves?

Because often times you have a better chance escaping them without severe damage, if you let them think they have control, while you are secretly filling your bank account and packing boxes that you hide in the closet.

The retaliation by a psychopathic narcissist is so severe it has driven many victims to suicide. Unless you have lived with them, you cannot imagine what they are capable of.